his events bulletin is produced weekly for Gorilla Radio, airing Thursdays 11-noon and Saturdays 8-9 am from CFUV (http://cfuv.uvic.ca) and Mondays 9-10 am from CJSF (http://cjsf.ca). You can also listen to the podcasts at http://www.gorilla-radio.com.
** please forward to friends and allies **
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Did you know Kinder Morgan are planning to expand their diesel facility in North Vancouver (Squamish territory)? Kinder Morgan do not have the consent of the Squamish band members to construct these two additional fuel storage tanks and related infrastructure!

Sut’lut Antone and Clarissa Antone invite you to a peaceful rally in front of The Grouse Inn (1633 Capilano Rd. and Marine Dr.) where KM will be holding their “info session.” Bring your good energy, banners, signs, and be ready to make some noise!

Contact: Clarissa Antone 604-779-4201

Apparently, KM only have to advise people living within 500 meters of the proposed expansion!

Here is an excerpt from the flyer that KM are delivering to homes in North Vancouver/Squamish reserve:
“KM Canada Marine Terminal Limited Partnership (the Applicant) is proposing to expand their diesel handling capabilities at 1995 W 1st St., North Vancouver by way of the Vancouver Wharves Diesel Handling Facility Expansion Project. As part of the Development Permit Application review process, the Applicant invites you to attend a Public Information Meeting to share information about this proposed Project.”

*Make sure you register for a free ticket on eventbrite to book your spot!*

As the national conversation about the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline gets more heated, let’s take a minute to step back and understand what this fight is really about.

Join us on February 22nd to hear from Coast Salish youth and spiritual leaders who were fighting this project long before most people had heard of it. The evening will feature powerful and grounding stories of Indigenous resistance to Big Oil and opportunities to learn about what’s next for the movement to #StopKM.

*WHERE*
Segal Conference Rooms 1410-1420 at SFU Harbour Centre

*WHEN*
Feb 22nd at 6:00 PM

*WHO*
The panelists include inspiring Coast Salish youth and spiritual leaders such as Will George, Ta’ah Amy George, Oceann Hyland and others

Join us on February 22nd for a screening of Vancouver Aquarium Uncovered at Cinecenta on the University of Victoria campus. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion, including the filmmaker Gary Charbonneau and Arden Beddoes, lawyer at Arvay Finlay LLP and counsel in two recent cases involving the Aquarium. Also speaking on the panel from the University of Victoria will be Rianna Burnham, doctoral fellow at the Whale Research Lab, and History professor Dr. Jason Colby, author of Orca: How We Came to Know and Love the Ocean’s Greatest Predator. The event is co-sponsored by Cinecenta and the Animals & Society Research Initiative at the University of Victoria.

Ticket prices range from $5.75 to $7.75, depending on senior/student or general public rates.

Vancouver Aquarium Uncovered has been described as Canada’s Blackfish, the 2013 documentary that revealed the darker side of cetacean capture and confinement at entertainment parks like SeaWorld. Vancouver Filmmaker Gary Charbonneau was compelled to make his film after Vancouver Park Board meetings raised concerns about the lack of research and conservation at the aquarium. Featuring interviews with Vancouver Aquarium staff, cetacean researchers and animal behaviourists, Vancouver Aquarium Uncovered asks whether it is ethical to capture and confine such intelligent marine mammals.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You Can Plant A Tree, But You Can’t Plant A Forest
feb 22nd

Thursday at 19:00–21:00

3 days from now

Room 159, Fraser Building, University of Victoria

Join the Wilderness Committee, UVic Environmental Law Club, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Sierra Club BC, Ancient Forest Alliance and the Ecoforestry Insitute for a presentation and discussion with Herb Hammond, a forest ecologist and forester with 40 years’ experience in applying ecosystem and culturally-based forest use throughout BC, across Canada, and in other parts of the world.

February 22nd is the same night as the Association of BC Forest Professionals (ABCFP) Annual General Meeting, also in Victoria.

While the ABCFP is talking status-quo logging and the continued liquidation of original rainforests on the BC coast, Herb will give a dynamic presentation on the simple fact that the big corporations still deny: you can plant a tree but you can’t plant a forest.

———————

BACKGROUND:

BC is a province built on forestry, and it’s critical that this industry be part of the economy moving forward.

But for too long, forests have been managed for corporate profits over Indigenous Rights and Title, healthy ecosystems, and thriving communities.

More and more people are calling for the protection of intact old-growth forests and a just transition to sustainable second-growth value-added forestry.

Unfortunately, the BC government is not yet taking this issue seriously, and logging corporations and many forest professionals are still claiming that the industry is doing the best it can for ecosystems and communities.

Some foresters are speaking up for truly respectful and sustainable forestry, including renowned eco-forester Herb Hammond.

After a presentation from Herb, there will be a brief response from Ben Parfitt, Resource Policy Analyst at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, and then a Q+A with both Herb and Ben.

The sponsor organizations will have tables, staff and volunteers at the event, so come and connect with the movement fighting for the protection of old-growth rainforests and a just transition to sustainable second-growth forestry!

Please join us for this free public event!

*This event is being held on unceded Lekwungen and WSANEC territories.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cafe Simpatico
Friday February 23

The Persistent Struggle for Justice in Guatemala Today — A situational
analysis of the social and legal actions to bring down impunity.

Presentation by Wendy Mendez, human rights activist, petitioner in the
Military Diary case, co-founder of HIJOS Guatemala (sons and daughters of
the disappeared), and popular educator.

We are gathering on Fridays to remind BC’s Minister of the Environment that he has a responsibility to honour Treaty 8, respect Indigenous law, and protect the life of the Peace River from being killed by the settler colonial violence also known as the Site C dam.

FightC is a non-partisan, non-violent grassroots community group committed to stopping the Site C dam in solidarity with the Treaty 8 First Nations. All who love and respect Peace are welcome to join us.

We acknowledge that this meeting takes place on the Unceded Territory of the Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh and Squamish Nations.

KPIRG presents “Beyond Tokenism”, a Black History Month panel discussion in which invited guests, Charles Quist-Adade, Leland Harper, Cicely Nicholson and Mariam Barry delve into a meta conversation about the significance of Black History Month (BHM) itself. We will be looking into the purpose of BHM, whether or not the way in which the month is currently celebrated fulfills that purpose, as well as discuss the radical potential that BHM can hold. Join us and take part in a fruitful and important conversation!

The discussion will be taking place at the KPU Surrey Campus in Fir 128 @ 3:30 p.m – Friday, February 23rd!

This is a free event open to all students and community members.

KPIRG acknowledges that this event is taking place on the unceded territories of the Kwantlen, Katzie, and Semiahoo Nations.

Do you like vegan cupcakes? Do you like to help animals?
Then come on down to Cha Cha Java on February 24, 2018 to support National Cupcake Day!! 🙂

We are looking for people to BRING cupcakes and to BUY cupcakes with all proceeds to support RASTA Sanctuary. http://rastarescue.org/

This is an animal friendly event, so please bring only vegan cupcakes ( no dairy, eggs, honey, gelatin, whey/cassein or other animal by-products ).

*Please bring cupcake donations no later than 11:45am to the inside of the Cha Cha Java. We will have tables set up for display and sale

*We will have paper bags to take home some goodies ( although it may be better for your purchased cupcakes if you bring some tupperware along ) and don’t forget $$ to fill up your containers and tummies 🙂

We are so grateful for all of your donations to help such a deserving cause.
Can’t wait!

Please come support RASTA (Rescue And Sanctuary for Threatened Animals). Delicious vegan cupcakes will be available and all proceeds will go to help our animal friends. See you there!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Vancouver- National Cupcake Day Fundraiser for RASTA Sanctuary!
Feb 24th

Do you like vegan cupcakes? Do you like to help animals?
Then come on down to the outside of Market on Yates on February 25, 2018 to support National Cupcake Day!! 🙂

We are looking for people to BRING cupcakes and to BUY cupcakes with all proceeds to support RASTA Sanctuary. http://rastarescue.org/

This is an animal friendly event, so please bring only vegan cupcakes ( no dairy, eggs, honey, gelatin, whey/cassein or other animal by-products ).

*Please bring cupcake donations no later than 11:45am to the front of the The Market on Yates. We will have tables set up for display and sale

*We will have paper bags to take home some goodies ( although it may be better for your purchased cupcakes if you bring some tupperware along ) and don’t forget $$ to fill up your containers and tummies 🙂

We are so grateful for all of your donations to help such a deserving cause.
Can’t wait!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Left Film Night: Palestine Now
Feb 25th

Join the Communist Party of Canada – Van East club & The Young Communist League Vancouver in viewing “Palestine Now”
(2017, UK documentary, 49 minutes)

This 2017 documentary looks at the impact of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory, fifty years after the Mid-East war of 1967. Israel’s apartheid policies have brought enormous hardship to the occupied West Bank and Gaza strip, including the massive destruction of homes and olive groves, the killing and jailing of thousands of Palestinians (including hundreds of children), and much more. The charges against teenager Ahed Tamimi and her current trial have again drawn the attention of the world to the crimes committed by the Israeli state against Palestine. The screening will include discussion of the latest developments in this struggle, including updates on the Tamimi family’s situation. Free admission; a collection will be taken towards the cost of holding Left Film Nights, with half of the proceeds going to local organizers of solidarity campaigns for Ahed Tamimi.

This event takes place on the traditional, unceded, occupied territories of the səlil̓wətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. In acknowledging this, we must be in solidarity with the struggles of the peoples of the territory in which we occupy.

*************
No admission charge, but donations towards our costs are welcome. Coffee and refreshments available. Left Film Nights are presented by the Centre for Socialist Education, Young Communist League, and the Vancouver East Club of the Communist Party of Canada. Call 604-255-2041 or email <pvoice@telus.net> for further information.

Why don’t the poor rise up? Even mainstream media such as the New York Times and The Economist have recently posed this question, uneasily amazed that capitalism hasn’t met with greater resistance. In the context of unparalleled global wealth disparity, ecological catastrophe, and myriad forms of structural oppression, this vibrant collection offers a reassessment of contemporary obstacles to mass mobilization, as well as examples from around the world of poor people overcoming those obstacles in inspiring and instructive new ways. With contributions from Idle No More organizer Alex Wilson, noted Italian autonomist Franco “Bifo” Berardi, Cooperation Jackson organizer Kali Akuno, Cape Town-based anarchists Aragorn Eloff and Anna Selmeczi, and sixteen other scholars and activists from around the world, including a Foreword by Affiong Limene Affiong, Nigerian co-founder of Moyo wa Taifa, a Pan-Afrikan Women’s Solidarity Network, Why Don’t the Poor Rise Up? presents a truly global range of perspectives that explore the question of revolution, its objective and subjective prerequisites, and its increasing likelihood in our time.

PANELISTS

Michael Truscello, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor in English and General Education at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. His academic interests include anarchism, the politics and poetics of infrastructure, petroculture, media studies, and technology studies. In 2013, he co-edited a special issue of Anarchist Studies on “anarchism and technology” with Uri Gordon. In 2011, he produced the documentary film Capitalism Is The Crisis: Radical Politics in the Age of Austerity. He is the author of Infrastructural Brutalism (MIT Press, forthcoming).

Ajamu Nangwaya, Ph.D., is an organizer, writer and educator. Ajamu is a lecturer in the Institute of Caribbean Studies at the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus and his areas of research interests are Rastafari ital livity and economic and social development, labour self-management and worker cooperatives, gender, development and social justice, music/the arts as a transformative force, and anarchism and participatory democracy. He is the co-editor with Dr. Michael Truscello of the recently published anthology Why Don’t The Poor Rise Up?: Organizing the Twenty-First Century Resistance. Ajamu is also the co-editor with Kali Akuno of the publication Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi. He worked for a number of years with the American South-based Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund as a cooperative educator and developer. He was a participant at the founding conference of the United States Federation of Worker Cooperatives and was elected to its first board of directors.

John Clarke first became involved in anti-poverty struggles in 1983 when he helped form the Union of Unemployed Workers in London, Ontario. Since 1990, he has worked as an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP).

Sara Sagaii is an Iranian housing and anti-war activist and a graduate student in the SFU School of Communication. She has organized against demovictions and for tent cities. She was a coordinator on the Jean Swanson for City Hall 2017 by-election campaign and is currently on the steering committee of the Vancouver Tenants Union.

Samir Gandesha is an Associate Professor in the Department of the Humanities and the Director of the Institute for the Humanities at Simon Fraser University. He specializes in modern European thought and culture, with a particular emphasis on the 19th and 20th centuries. His recent books include Reification and Spectacle: On the Timeliness of Western Marxism (Amsterdam University Press) and Aesthetic Marx (Bloomsbury Press).

This lecture will examine the question of basic income (BI), focusing on two key issues. Firstly, I will argue that a neoliberal version of BI is being considered and even developed by a number of governments and institutions of global capitalism. This form of BI could enhance the supply of low wage precarious workers, by offering a public subsidy to employers, paid for by cuts to others areas of social provision. Secondly, I will explore and counter what I argue is a delusional notion on the political left that, regardless of neoliberal realities or the fundamental nature of the capitalist job market, it will somehow be possible to ensure that a universal, unconditional and adequate form of income support, a UBI, can be created. I will argue that this false hope for a social policy end run around neoliberal austerity is diversionary and dangerous and should be rejected.

SPEAKER

John Clarke first became involved in anti-poverty struggles in 1983 when he helped form the Union of Unemployed Workers in London, Ontario. Since 1990, he has worked as an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP).

RESPONDENTS

Jenna van Draanen, PhD, serves on the Board of Directors of the Basic Income Canada Network and is a member of the Executive Committee for the Basic Income Earth Network. She is a postdoctoral researcher based at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and is committed to working toward health equity and social justice. Her research looks at the role of poverty in mental health and substance use disorders.

Michal Rozworski is a union researcher and economist based in Vancouver, BC. His writing has appeared in Jacobin, Ricochet, the Toronto Star, Briarpatch Magazine and The Globe and Mail, among others. He produces the Political Eh-conomy blog and is currently working on a book, The People’s Republic of Walmart, with Leigh Phillips.

Trish Garner is the provincial organizer for the BCPRC. She is a tea swilling Brit with a passion for social justice. As the Community Organizer of the BC Poverty Reduction Coalition, a broad-based network of over 400 organizations throughout BC, she focuses on communications, outreach and community engagement to raise awareness about the root causes of poverty and inequality, and how we can collectively tackle them. She has a PhD in gender, sexuality and women’s studies from SFU and continues to work on LGBTQ issues. Trish lives with her partner and their three young children in East Vancouver.

Duane Fontaine is a professional accountant and is currently a PhD student in SFU’s interdisciplinary SAR program. He is studying the nature of work in contemporary society and is contrasting it with an examination of alternative visions for the future of work. The widespread application of robotics, automation and artificial intelligence into the productive economy threatens the future of work. Duane is revisiting the utopian quest for an Aesthetic State and how its emancipatory potential, combined with such transitional solutions as Universal Basic Income, might present an opportunity to redefine the very nature and purpose of work in a way that enhances meaning and freedom.

Location: room 1700, SFU Harbour Centre. Both the building and room are wheelchair accessible.

Note: there will be a book signing at the end of the event.

DR. RAMZY BAROUD AND THE PALESTINIAN NARRATIVE

Gaza-born Palestinian author discusses the Palestine Chronicle, his forthcoming book: The Last Earth: A Palestinian Story, and the urgent need to situate Palestinian refugees back at the center of the Palestinian discourse. His talk will also cover contemporary issues facing the Palestinian liberation movement.

ABOUT THE BOOK

This is a history of modern Palestine like no other: built from the testimony of people who have lived through it. Ramzy Baroud here gathers accounts from countless Palestinians from all walks of life, and from throughout the decades, to tell the story of the nation and its struggle for independence and security. Challenging both academic and popular takes on Palestinian history, Baroud unearths here the deep commonalities within the story of Palestine, ones that draw the people together despite political divisions, geographical barriers and walls, factionalism, occupation, and exile. Through these firsthand reports—by turns inspiring and terrifying, triumphant and troubled—we see Palestine in all its complexity and contradictions, ever vibrant in the memories of the people who have fought, physically and otherwise, for its future. A remarkable book, The Last Earth will be essential to understanding the struggles in the contemporary Middle East.

SPEAKER

Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and editor of Palestine Chronicle. His latest book is The Last Earth: A Palestinian Story (Pluto Press, London). Baroud has a Ph.D. in Palestine Studies from the University of Exeter and is a Non-Resident Scholar at Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies, University of California Santa Barbara. His website is www.ramzybaroud.net.